2 EDWARD WILLIAMS MORLEY— CLARKE [Memo,KS [vo a l t xxi'; 



intended for publication. These details I take almost verbatim from Morley's personal memo- 

 randa. This early work is a forecast of his later career, and illustrates his intense devotion to 

 accuracy. He might well have become an astronomer, but chemistry was his first love. 



It has already been said that Morley's father was a clergyman; and so, too, was his 

 mother's only brother. Quite naturally it was decided that he should follow their example, 

 and so in 1861 he entered Andover Theological Seminary, where he completed the course of 

 study in 1864. It was here, doubtless, that he added to his knowledge of Latin and Greek 

 a good working knowledge of Hebrew. 



Morley's health was still poor, and he felt unable to undertake the duties of a minister. 

 The Civil War was nearing its end, and during the year 1864-65 he was in the service of the 

 sanitary commission, and was put in charge of their station at Fortress Monroe, Va. The 

 next year he resumed his studies at Andover, and in the years 1866-1868 he taught in the 

 South Berkshire Academy, at Marlboro, Mass. What subjects he taught is not stated. 



His health was nowrestored and he sought for an opportunity to enter the ministry. Pres- 

 ently he was called to a small church at Twinsburg, Ohio. At about the same time he was 

 offered and accepted the chair of natural history and chemistry in Western Reserve College, 

 at Hudson, Ohio. In this very mild contest between science and theology, science was vic- 

 torious. This was the turning point of Morley's career. He might have succeeded as a clergy- 

 man, for he was conscientious in all his varied kinds of work. He was an admirable lecturer, 

 and doubtless would have been a good preacher; but what a loss to science had he chosen the 

 other path. In scientific research Morley found his true vocation. 



When Morley assumed his professorship at Hudson his opportunities for anything like 

 original scientific work were small. The college, like nearly all American colleges at that 

 time, had the old-fashioned fixed curriculum, in which the so-called classical languages were 

 given the first place, and the natural and physical sciences were subordinate to them. The 

 languages were supposed to be the essentials of scholarship; and a man who was deficient in 

 Latin and Greek was not regarded as a scholar. Mathematics was taught as a matter of course, 

 but was not carried very far. The observational and experimental sciences were mainly if 

 not entirely taught by lectures and recitations, which might give some useful information but 

 hardly any mental discipline. Few students were brought to realize that great new branches 

 of knowledge had been developed, which were not only alive but also rapidly growing. Shortly 

 before moving to Hudson, Morley married Miss Isabella Ashley Birdsall, of West Winsted, 

 Conn. They had no children. 



It is easy to see that Morley entered upon his duties as a college professor under a heavy 

 handicap. He was called upon to teach, in addition to chemistry, two other sciences, namely, 

 geology and botany, which left him little time for research. For the students the conditions were 

 equally unfortunate. The college curriculum allowed so little time for instruction in any branch 

 of science that even the brightest student could hardly get any real insight into the true sig- 

 nificance of his studies. % 



Morley, however, was not easily discouraged. In spite of difficulties, he fitted up a small 

 room as a chemical laboratory, and his pupils were given their first experience in laboratory 

 practice; that is, they were taught to experiment, to observe facts accurately, and to draw 

 correct conclusions from what they saw. They gained a new kind of mental discipline, of which 

 the classicists had never dreamed. In this mode of teaching Morley originated nothing. He 

 was merely a pioneer in the work of the smaller colleges; work in which the older American 

 universities had already gone far. In the universities of continental Europe the laboratory 

 methods of instruction had long been established, and American students who were able to 

 do so went to France and Germany for advanced training in the sciences, and especially in 

 methods of research. Morley had not had the advantage of foreign study, but he saw the light 

 and followed it. At quite an early date he was even able to offer his students a course in quali- 

 tative analysis. Few of the smaller colleges went so far. 



Professor Tower, in his biographical notice of Morley, of which I venture to make free 

 use, says that his teaching — 



